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US may deploy second carrier to Israel

[MigraineCall]

Could it be that the US seems to think they will need as many as 2 carrier strike groups in the theatre to protect Israel after Israel commences turning Gaza to dust?

BBG:

The U.S. may deploy a second aircraft carrier near Israel, U.S. defense officials said, an escalation of the U.S. military effort to deter regional powers from joining the war between Hamas and Israel.

The USS Dwight D. Eisenhower and its accompanying ships were scheduled months ago to sail this week for the Middle East. They are expected to reach the Middle East in roughly two weeks, defense officials said.

The USS Gerald R. Ford and its accompanying ships, some of which have nuclear capabilities, are expected to arrive later on Tuesday, defense officials said.

The Pentagon is considering, but hasn't formally decided, whether the Eisenhower would relieve the Ford or both groups would remain, defense officials said.

The U.S. last had two carriers in the region in 2020 after a deadly rocket attack on Camp Taji in Iraq killed two American troops and one British service member.

Got oil?

[Experienced]

The Ford class aircraft carrier has more fighter aircraft onboard than the total number of F18s that are operational in the whole Canadian airforce.  Iran has 34 F16s of which 66% are estimated to be operational.  The rest of the fleet are Soviet era fighters dating back to 1979 which would be totally useless today.  This means that the Ford by itself has 3X the number of decent

[MigraineCall]

Unfortunately, Iran is not the only potential threat to Israel within striking distance. Fire is now being exchanged with Lebanon, and Syria. Watch Egypt, as it tries to deliver aid, which Israel has warned not to attempt to deliver along the southern Gaza border at Raffa.

[Experienced]

Migraine...True but the US is highly unlikely to actually engage especially under Biden and his gang so the second carrier is just optics as far as I am concerned.  For Syria and Lebanon, the Ford Class flotilla has ample cruise missles to take care of Syria and Lebanon if it actually came to that.  They wouldn't probably need any fighter jets to deal with Syria and especially

[liljohnnyjoke]

Depends what happens next, if this massive Israeli army ground force starts marching through Gaza concentrated area of 2 million and killing every Palestinian "animal" as they call them in sight in a complete genocide kind of way as a Final Solution and daily death tolls start mounting to 10s or even hundreds of thousands a day then other actors in the area likely will do something like

[meritmat]

Perfect excuse to turn the place into glass 

[Experienced]

liljohnny....good post Here are some thoughts on this... 1....neither Saudi Arabia or the Gulf arab states are likely to intervene military in a conflict between Hamas and Israel.  They may covertly provide them with money and/or try to get supplies to them.  In the specific case of Saudi Arabia, as I mentioned in an earlier post, MBS is not a fan of Hamas and some of his closest

[liljohnnyjoke]

this is a good read, graphic near end shows how gulf players align https://www.reuters.com/graphics/MIDEAST-ATTACKS-HORMUZ/0100B0B50N3/index.html I think Iran only gets involved if their oil refineries and production facilities are hit with cruise missiles, then will lauch whatever they have against Israel Also they will sink every tanker they can going through the Straits of Hormuz and mine it

[bttmfischer]

Amid all this goings-on no word from the Ukrainen brutalities., the Russians have been doing daily, for over a year. Instead, the socialist media is Complaining about Gaza. In Bakhmut, Ukraine, NOT A SINGLE BUILDING STANDS, because of the Russian bombardment. Same in the southern Ukrainene city of Melitopol. Every building was levelled and locals shipped to Russia.. What did the UN do? Nothing as

[Experienced]

bt...good point about Ukraine As for mining the Gaza-Egyptian border....that wouldn't actually do much (even if the Israelis were actually able to do it) since most of the stuff coming from Egypt goes through an elaborate tunnel system and to stop that it would involve violating Egypt's territorial integrity which obviously isn't on the table.

[bttmfischer]

Exprcd, true, except trucks cannot be driven in tunnels in large numbers.

[Experienced]

bt....dunno My General friend said over the weekend that based on Israeli intelligence, Hamas and an associated terrorist group in Gaza have about 15,000 rockets.  They got them and the materials to build them from somewhere and the sea route is controlled by the Israeli navy.